Through the kitchen window he caught sight of Mr Urselli, an earlier riser, sitting on the edge of the well at the back and filing his nails meditatively. He went out as soon as he had finished his coffee and nailed his fellow guest with every circumstance of affability.
“What cheer, Amadeo,” he said.
Mr Urselli jerked round sharply, identified him, and relaxed. “Morn’n’,” he said.
His manner was preoccupied, but it took more than that to deter Simon once he had reached a decision. The Saint traveled round and sank cheerfully onto a reach of parapet at his victim’s side. In a similar fashion one of Nero’s lions might have circumnavigated a plump martyr.
“Amadeo,” said the Saint, “will you tell me a secret? Why do you carry a gun?”
Urselli stopped filing abruptly. For a couple of seconds he did not move, and then his eyes slewed round, and they were narrowed to brown slits.
“Whaddaya mean?”
“I know you carry a gun,” said the Saint quietly.
Urselli’s gaze shifted first. He looked down at his hands.
“You gotta be able to take care of yourself in my business,” he explained, and if his voice was a shade louder than was necessary, many ears less delicately tuned than the Saint’s might not have noticed it. “Why, it was nothing to travel about the country with fifty grand worth of ice on me. Suppose I hadn’t packed a roscoe — hell, I’d of been heisted once a week!”